Should I(E) stay or should I(E) go?

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

Simple question. What do you think?

[tankcopters n aids]

Thanks Ian, but off ya pop

[Bertie Wooster]

He can't stay IMO, after yesterday I think he's lost the majority of the fans.

[The_Gun]

I’d thank him for a great few years, but unfortunately his limitations have been exposed too many times this year and I’m no longer confident he’s the right man to take us forward.

Edit: Of course we’d need to have a suitable replacement lined up. I’d be strongly in favour of a young up-and-comer like Rosenior, Nolan or maybe Brennan at Barnet. I’m sure there are plenty of others that I’m not aware of.

[Mar]

Highest number of goals we've scored for many a year, 100 over a season and 100 over a calendar year. So he stays for me.

Whilst i'm still seething about yesterday's turgid non performance, I see that as an issue with the entire club and not just solely on Evatt. Sure the blame lies with Evatt because we've seen it several times over the course of the season and matches like this aren't getting changed for the better.

I think generally we have more good than bad here. We just need to help Evatt. If he can't be helped or doesn't want to be helped then it'd be a case of so long and thanks for the memories.

There's a clear psychological issue with players in these matches and a clear rigidity causing us to fail in these matches.

It can seemingly be solved by solving tactical changes, signing those with a tough mentality and a psychologist to help the rest.

Big Sam in an advisory role should be help enough I would imagine.

[Prufrock]

Temperature is understandably running hot!

I think he'll be given next season and I think that's right, but I wouldn't be laying any money on him still being manager this time next season.

That was truly terrible yesterday, and next season is a long time away but fans have long memories and there are a lot who will take some winning back from here.

I really really hope that's the last we see of 3-5-bastard-2.

Too much pressure on the wing backs. Dacres-Cogley is a good player, but you're asking him to do too much. Has to defend, has to be tidy on the ball, has to cover an insane amount of ground, and has to be our entire attacking threat down one side. In all the time we've played this system, we've had two players, both Prem loanees who looked even remotely capable of doing it. Put a winger in front of him!

Doesn't need wingers, so you don't sign any, so you have no options and can only ever "do plan A better". I really hope he bins it off and signs at least two wingers this summer. He has shown that flexibility before, in a transfer window, and is going to need to again.

Oxford were excellent tbf, really well coached they absolutely nailed how to play against us. And we had no answers. Start wide players cutting out the wing backs, leave Santos and Toal to the ball and get ready to jump on the midfield. They've also shown flexibility between a 433 and a 343. That's what we need to have.

The players were poor yesterday, but much more on the manager for me. It's been very clear for a long long time that we're very good, maybe 2/3 of the time, and if so we win. But we're absolutely horrible the other 1/3 and do not pick up enough points in those types of games to go up.

Next season the league will be tougher, but I don't think it will be as tough as last season (before the one just gone). And we've had three years now at recruitment in this league so should be well set.

I think he'll be here in August (unless he walks) but he'd better start well or it's going to be grim.

[Prufrock]

Oh and if he does go Buckingham-type is exactly what we need.

Duff and Ainsworth? Jesus Christ on a bike. I swear some of fanbase are masochists. Aside from needing to bleach the eyes of 25,000 people, you'd need to rip it all up and start again. Pompey and Oxford this year, Ipswich and Plymouth last have shown you don't need to clog your way to success here (and importantly for the latter two be successful in the league above). This team has made the play-offs two years in a row with 80+ points. I know people are annoyed, but it doesn't need ripping up. It needs tweaks to make it more resilient.

[HMX]

Still too raw after yesterday so I’m on the ‘go’ side but I could see the board letting him have his final year. But the performance yesterday was peak Evatt-ball-when-it-goes-wrong and I’m not sure there’s a way back with a lot of fans. Maybe Sharon sees it differently.

[jmjhb]

I think this depends if he has the commitment to oversee a rebuild.

I'm honestly not sure he does, so I'm going to say "go".

[BWFC_Insane]

Go. If he’s here next season it will be toxic and horrific. If he stays it shows he has no integrity or ethics.

He needs to resign tomorrow.

As for all the ‘we need a modern manager’ guff. I have no problem with having a modern manager but what that seems to mean is someone unproven who talks up some nonsense.

How did Oxford get promoted? Not through modern nonsense. They pressed hard conceded 5 goals in their last 11 and stopped the opponents midfield. Their performance yesterday is exactly how Allardyce would have set them up or Ainsworth or Duff.

So happy for a manager who can do that. Whatever of the ‘image boxes’ they tick. But we mainly need honesty. We need a manager who calls a spade a spade. Stop pretending that santos is a ‘top defender’ when he isn’t. Realise you need character and grit and fight and physicality in the side. Stop mollycoddling the players. If they can’t do the basics they need telling. If they shirk like sheehan does they need absolutely physically telling and then being shown the door.

League one is a fight. Bare minimum you have to win that fight every single game. You need a physically imposing motivated and dominant side able to cover the ground. With a few star attackers to win the games.

[Abdoulaye's Twin]

I'm a little conflicted as I probably land somewhere near Pru in that we're not far away with a some personnel changes and a different approach/setup. It would be easy to say go now as the not showing up has happened far too frequently. If the mantra is more but better than he can go for me. If he's prepared to change things and win the battle to enable us to play then great - I think he can do it, but I'm far from convinced he wants to or thinks he needs to.

I suspect he with either double down or concoct a narrative to enable him to leave because it is someone else's fault. The telling thing is (if he really believes it) that he was surprised by yesterday. Everyone else knew it was 50-50 which version would show up and I don't think any of us are surprised it was what it was.

[Mar]

From a manager, I want to see us winning the majority of matches, have success and head in the right direction.

We've got that under Evatt's tenure.

It's been progress season after season and this season we've fell short of where we want to be, despite progress. We should've gone up. Failing to do so is shocking, especially in the manner in which we fell apart, especially several times we've fallen apart this season.

As frustrating as it is, it still feels like we're ticking a lot of boxes that i'd consider to be a good manager.

Win a lot of games.
Score a lot of goals.
Control the majority of games.
Compete for promotion.
Play at Wembley.


I hate that we performed so badly yesterday. I hate that its a repeat of other games where we've been terrible.

A season of underachieving doesn't destroy whats come before. I does however tarnish it.

[officer_dibble]

Did we keep the receipt?

[nicholaldo]

Did we keep the receipt?

This is a big thing for me: his behaviour in the press and his general character.

He seems to have a great deal of self-regard but is also very sensitive to criticism and, in my view, fragile under pressure. Too often he stokes animosity only to end up on the wrong side of it all. It feels counter-productive.

During the run-in, his indulging in self-pity at times we needed firing up (see his comments before the Barnsley away league fixture lamenting how tough a week he'd had and how he'd mull things over in the summer) and narcissism - "I keep all the receipts" - just seemed bizarre.

Add in the videoing himself waving his junk at a female journalist, and things like all of a sudden deciding to wear a suit at the DW (before getting involved in an altercation on the pitch after the final whistle) and it's only solidified my opinion of him as a bit of a fool.

[nicholaldo]

Also concerning, is that in his post-match press conference yesterday, he claimed our performance was "unrecognisable" and he couldn't understand why it went wrong.

[Mar]

Also concerning, is that in his post-match press conference yesterday, he claimed our performance was "unrecognisable" and he couldn't understand why it went wrong.

He said it was unrecognisable.

I'm sure all Bolton fans would disagree. Weve seen that before. That's the problem.

[TANGODANCER]

Go. If he’s here next season it will be toxic and horrific. If he stays it shows he has no integrity or ethics.
He needs to resign tomorrow.

That more than a bit, "Off with his head". Would you? Or just hold your hand up and say you got it wrong on the day? I know we're being asked our opinion, so stay for me.

[BWFC_Insane]

From a manager, I want to see us winning the majority of matches, have success and head in the right direction.

We've got that under Evatt's tenure.

It's been progress season after season and this season we've fell short of where we want to be, despite progress. We should've gone up. Failing to do so is shocking, especially in the manner in which we fell apart, especially several times we've fallen apart this season.

As frustrating as it is, it still feels like we're ticking a lot of boxes that i'd consider to be a good manager.

Win a lot of games.
Score a lot of goals.
Control the majority of games.
Compete for promotion.
Play at Wembley.


I hate that we performed so badly yesterday. I hate that its a repeat of other games where we've been terrible.

A season of underachieving doesn't destroy whats come before. I does however tarnish it.

The problem is this argument falls down in my view.

It’s always been a false proposition. Getting ‘better’ season by season is a false narrative mostly in football. Yes it can happen. Teams can get stronger. But mostly football is a series of individual seasons that the end result of them dictate the trajectory of football clubs.

Were we any better in a meaningful way this season than last? No. We were not. We benefitted from a weaker league. But the exact same fault lines were exposed in exactly the same way as the last.

Managers are judged on results. This season the only result that mattered was promotion. Winning a bunch of games 7-0 is absolutely meaningless if you don’t at the end of it achieve what you set out to do.

Next season this league will be incredibly tough. A bunch of teams with experienced proven managers at this level who will all be as it stands more physical than we are, more compact and with far stronger characters than we have. But promotion will be the aim and will be an absolute must. It will take a new squad being built in a summer and an absolute drive to squeeze every result out and get every ounce out of a fully committed more experienced less naive group.

Evatt has had three years and has built up this squad in actuality and also in his words. To say he’s the man to deconstruct it and operate in a mode that will get us promotion next season is I think not clutching at straws but blind hope and way beyond optimism. He’s not shown an ability to do that in his career yet. And if he wants to go and take some learning then I don’t see why we should afford him loads of years to do that and finally get it right.

He says he didn’t see it coming except we’ve seen it every few games for three seasons. If he didn’t see that coming I’m not sure what he’s being paid for.

Evatt doesn’t have the know how or I think humility to deliver what is needed. We need to be a machine next season. Win after win. Most games you can’t play well but you win. Because you are physically stronger and more organised than the opposition and possess just enough quality to get the goal or goals needed. That’s league one. That’s how you get out. We know the teams, the pitches, the referees and none of these can be used as excuses.

I don’t detect the drive in Evatt that managers like Parky for example have. The drive to get over the line time and time again. It’s too Owen Coyle. Too naive. Too nice.

We will win a few games in the August sunshine. Look nice every now and again. But when the Blackpool’s Wigan’s, Rotherham’s, Wrexham’s roll round we know what will happen. When the crunch games come we know what happens. Evatt isn’t going to change here.

[Worthy4England]

Think yesterday spoke volumes. One more year was last year's press release (to which I sorta went "yeah ok").

Worsened the defence, hasn't solved the big problems. No notion of how to recruit players with some balls coz it don't sppear on a spreadsheet.

Worst indictment. Most fans knew after 10 minutes we were done yesterday. And the majority probably weren't too surprised...

[irie Cee Bee]

If we want to stay in the Division and be loyal, keep Evatt. If we want to go up, then a sign of madness would be to keep doing the same thing and expect a different outcome. Go for me.